


these glossy bloodshot eyes of mine (say this is about as desperate as i get)

by Simpliicity



Series: Storms & Coffee [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Barista Rey, Ben Solo Needs A Hug, But if you like Rey taking care of drunk Ben you might like it too idk, F/M, Snoke Being a Dick, TW: Vomiting, This is based off a roleplay so this is basically written for Erica, lawyer ben
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-11
Updated: 2020-01-11
Packaged: 2021-02-27 12:15:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,619
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22216891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Simpliicity/pseuds/Simpliicity
Summary: Ben doesn't handle failure well.In fact, he handles it about as badly as anyone can.
Relationships: Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Series: Storms & Coffee [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1614100
Comments: 8
Kudos: 55





	these glossy bloodshot eyes of mine (say this is about as desperate as i get)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [raindropwaltz](https://archiveofourown.org/users/raindropwaltz/gifts).



> AAAAAAAAAHHHHH. I never write fic so this is basically a present for @raindropwaltz based on our RP babies because that's the only reason I'm ever inspired to write fic. So.
> 
> Basically, lawyer Ben loses a case and proceeds to handle it by getting absolutely shitfaced.

It was no secret that Ben didn’t handle failure well.

His outbursts were well-known in the courtrooms and in the tabloids. The upper society columns that covered the richest of the rich in New York City fought tooth and nail to be the ones to break the news of Ben Solo’s latest courtroom meltdown, offering _anything_ to be the ones that receive the exclusive scoop from whoever he’d targeted. If an intern hadn’t witnessed him in all his furious glory firsthand, they’d heard likely unexaggerated stories from another. His anger and passion—along with his near-perfect case record—were what made him one of the most desirable lawyers for criminals and ne’er-do-wells and one of the most formidable opponents for prosecutors. The emotional highs combined in a whirlwind of fire, determination, and relentlessness to make most cases slam-dunks even when the odds were stacked against him, and it had brought him to some of his highest peaks.

It had also brought him the lowest lows.

Skipping out on casework had finally caught up with him, and though he’d done all the preparation he could—even sacrificing time with Rey to make sure he wouldn’t be caught up in loopholes or blindsided by a piece of evidence he’d missed—Snoke had handed him an impossible case. As good as he was, he couldn’t argue against clear video evidence, and he’d not only lost the case but been the subject of Snoke’s fury afterwards. The old man couldn’t hurt him physically, not anymore, not since he’d gone through a growth spurt right out of undergrad and gained a foot of height and nearly sixty pounds of muscle and tone, but psychologically, he’d ripped Ben apart, laughing as he reduced the six-foot-three former prodigy to tears before sending him home with a thinly-veiled threat of sending more cases he couldn’t win his way.

As he’d exited Snoke’s office, avoided by paparazzi—hopefully he’d scared them off the last time he’d nearly assaulted one of them, either that or they’d finally decided to give him some mercy, though he didn’t have much hope for that—and slipped into a towncar driven by one of the firm’s many interns, he _knew_ he should pull out his phone and call Rey. He knew it was one of the only things that would make him feel _okay_ again, that she would happily take the time to calm him down and reassure him, but he knew she was at work, and he couldn’t burden her with his stupid problems. What would he sound like, ranting and raving about the job that allowed him to never have to worry about money another day in his life while she fought for ten minutes away from serving the public? _Entitled_. _Selfish_.

 _Stupid_ , like Snoke had drilled into him.

So instead, he directed the intern to Park Avenue Liquor, swiping bottles off the top shelf with wanton disregard for what they were; he didn’t care how it tasted, he only cared that it was expensive and strong, and when he swiped the black Centurion Card for an assortment of cognac and scotch that would keep him tanked into next month if he wanted—and he _did_ want—he didn’t even think twice about signing for an amount well into the five figures. The bottles were loaded up into a box and set gently in the backseat next to him, his fingers curling around one before the car had even pulled away from the curb.

By the time the town car pulled up outside his apartment building, Ben was already slurring his words, the unlucky intern communicating with the doorman to have the bottles sent up to his apartment as the younger kid—Ben barely remembered his name, though with how much he’d already drank, he was surprised he could remember his own—slung one of Ben’s arms over his shoulders to help lift him from the car. The elevator ride and the walk down the hall to his suite blurred together, with him only coming to briefly as the intern began to speak.

“Anything else you require, sir?” came the high-pitched voice, the skinny young man’s form going in and out of focus as Ben squinted to try and focus his vision. Ben paused for a few minutes, trying to gather his thoughts, and he knew he looked a mess, jaw slightly agape as his brows furrowed like he was doing complex equations rather than trying to answer a simple question.

Eventually, he just shook his head.

“Right, well, Mr. Snoke wanted me to mention that you’ll be asked to return to the office on Monday,” he stuttered, wincing as he prepared for an onslaught from Ben, but to his surprise, the dark-haired man just nodded again, seemingly in a stupor. With no outburst of yelling, he took that as his cue to leave, shutting the door so loud it made Ben blink hard as he left.

“Fuck,” he mumbled, standing from the sectional he’d been arranged on with some difficulty, stripping himself of the clothes he’d worn that day and tossing them to the floor as he made the journey from his living room to his bedroom. Tailored Brioni garments, one-of-a-kind and made specifically for him, fell to the lush carpet, wrinkled and reeking of liquor; he didn’t know if dry-cleaning would fix the seven-thousand-dollar suit and he found he really didn’t _care_. Grey sweatpants replaced suit pants, his top half left bare, and he ventured back to the kitchen to wrap a large hand around the neck of a bottle of Glenmorangie that he’d cracked open in the car, well on his way to finishing it by the end of the night as he slugged a few sips before returning to his seat on the couch. One leg up on the ottoman, the other firmly planted on the floor in a futile effort to stop the room from spinning, he leaned forward to pick up his phone from where it had landed on the floor as he’d stripped. One eye closed, the other squinting, he began to scroll through his notifications.

One text from Snoke.

-

**Snoke:**

**You’d better be in fit shape to take on the Levitt case on Monday, or don’t bother showing up. I’m sure Armitage would make a fine replacement after the showing you gave today.**

-

Ben left that one on read, along with a few from Hux gloating about the results of his own case—he had long since learned that responding to Hux when he was drunk only led to the red-haired man screenshotting the texts and holding them over his head when he was coherent again—only stopping the movement of his thumb when he found a cluster of notifications from Rey.

-

**Rey: hey how did ur case go??**

**Rey: ben?? r u still in the courtrm? i figured it would be over by now but idk about ur fancy lawyer stuff haha**

**Rey: are u ok?**

**Rey: i’m worried about u**

-

He groaned, long and pained, as he sipped from the bottle again. Logically, he knew that he was in no state to try and reply to her, but when had he ever made a good decision?

-

**Ben: I lay th cdse**

-

Wait. That didn’t make sense.

-

**Ben: I Lott the char**

**Ben: Last the cfse**

**Ben: Duck**

-

As Rey’s phone incessantly buzzed in her pocket on her commute home from the coffee shop, she pulled it out instantly, hoping it would be a call from Ben; he usually called after his cases, especially ones that ran long, to apologize for keeping her waiting and ask her about her day, dutifully listening to her tell him a story or two about some funny customer or rant about how stressful class had been before making an offhand remark about him winning his case and going on to make plans for the two of them afterwards. At the very least, he would let her know that he was tired from the courtroom and would call her the following day, but he _never_ went without answering her texts. As she cocked her head to the side, trying to decipher his messages, she realized why he hadn’t. He was _drunk_.

He’d told her after a few dates about his issues with alcohol, that he was trying to give it up but that he hadn’t yet been successful; that talking to her made him feel like he didn’t need to drink anyway but that he couldn’t promise he never would again. She’d consoled him, telling him they all let loose occasionally, that he didn’t need to worry and that they’d cross that bridge when they’d come to it, that she trusted him and that he could talk to her about it any time.

She hadn’t expected that time to be when he was _plastered_.

-

**Rey: wut?? ben are u ok?? where are u??**

-

The buzz was heard faintly from the bathroom, and when he returned with his pants still hung low on his waist, he tripped over his own feet and faceplanted into the couch, laughing to himself as he rolled over and grabbed his phone. He could barely see the words on the screen, so instead of trying to type again, he picked it up and jabbed at it a few times before growing frustrated and holding down the home button with his thumb, placing the phone in front of him as he sprawled on his stomach, face turned sideways on the cool leather.

“Siri, call Rey,” he managed to get out, bringing one hand up to brush disheveled hair from his forehead and knocking the phone a bit further out of reach.

She picked up on the first ring, her voice already audible through the speakers.

“Ben? Ben, what’s going on?” she asked. She sounded worried. He didn’t like it when she worried. Why was she worried?

“’samatter?” he asked, and she held her phone tighter to her ear, plugging the other to try and hear him better.

“What?” she asked, her voice louder, as the others on the train looked at her with disdain. “Ben, I can’t hear you, give me a second,” she said, her voice raised, offering a shrug of apology as she stood to get off at the next stop, running out into the winter air and sighing as his mumbling became clearer. “Ben, are you alright?” she repeated.

“I’m fiiiiiine,” he responded, stretching the word out and chuckling at how comical it sounded. “Fine, fine, fine. Why?”

Removing the phone from her ear to study it like it would give her some sort of answer, she figured out what was going on quickly—something he was grateful for, since it meant he didn’t have to speak it aloud. “Are you drunk?”

“No,” he protested instantly, though he sounded guilty, much like a child would when caught edging too close to a hot stove. “Yeah,” he amended—even at his worst, he didn’t want to lie to her.

Sighing, Rey looked up at the cross-streets, trying to figure out where she’d gotten off the subway. “Where are you?” she asked bluntly, her voice taking a bit of an edge; just because she’d told him she wouldn’t be _mad_ at him didn’t mean she wasn’t disappointed, but most of all, she was _worried_. She’d seen what people who got too drunk would do, what could happen to them—and she knew that no one else was there with him. He didn’t _have_ anyone else.

“’M at home,” he answered sheepishly. “Miss you.”

She ignored him. She had to focus on getting there, on making sure he was _physically_ okay before they even began to tackle the mental side of things. “I’m coming over. It’ll take me a little bit to get there, but just—”

“Use my Uber,” he interrupted her; they’d added his card to her account a few weeks back, him offering after she’d gotten a rare night off work and he couldn’t get out of the office long enough to go pick her up. He’d paid for her car home, and since had been telling her to use it for rides to work when the weather got too bad, though he didn’t know if she’d taken him up on it or not. It wasn’t like he _checked_ his bank account.

“Fine,” she responded, tight-lipped. “Just… take care of yourself until I get there, okay?”

He didn’t respond and she hung up, cursing, as she frantically typed the beginning of his address into the app, already saved from the few times she’d used it to get there—all for much happier occasions. Powerless to do much more, she sat in the backseat of the Uber, fists clenching then unclenching as she chewed on her bottom lip, her whole body vibrating with nervous energy.

-

Ben’s phone stayed on the couch, already forgotten as he stood, bottle in hand, for another trek into the bathroom. If she was coming, the least he could do was clean himself up a bit, he figured, though he only got as far as running the water for the shower before the nausea hit and he found himself collapsing to his knees in front of the toilet. Body wracked with heaves, the entirety of the six-thousand-dollar bottle of scotch found a new home, leaving him coughing and sputtering until he managed the strength to reach up for a bottle of mouthwash on the corner of his sink counter. Rinsing his mouth, he spit the contents into the bowl in front of him before flushing the evidence away, slumping against the cool glass of the shower door with his eyes screwed shut.

If only the room would stop spinning.

-

If she would have had more time, she would have dwelled on the fact that the lobby of Ben’s apartment building looked _far_ too fancy, even from the outside, for her to consider walking into. She would have fixated on the marble floors, the mahogany of the concierge’s desk, the fact that a _doorman_ had opened the door for her and beckoned her in without a second thought—as though he _expected_ her. When she approached the desk, out of breath, she expected a threat to call security at best, a presentation already prepared for the bored-looking older woman when she held up a finger to stop her.

“Say no more, child,” the woman instructed her. “You’re here for Mr. Solo, correct?”

Rey gaped at the woman. “I—How did you know?”

“Gave us your picture a few months ago. Said if you ever showed up here, that we’re to let you in with no questions. I guess we’ve got you to thank for smacking some sense into that boy; he hasn’t given us attitude since that very day,” the woman mused, handing her a key card over the surface of the desk. “Go around the corner and put that card in the elevator door and hit the ‘P’ button at the top, and here’s his key.”

With the card and the key grasped in her hand, Rey followed the woman’s directions, swiping the card in the doorway and pressing the button before gripping the handle bordering the elevator as it zoomed upwards to steady herself. When it cruised to a stop and the doors opened in front of her, only one doorway was visible down a long hallway decorated with scattered pieces of fine art, and she stepped to it before knocking.

When she received no answer, she pressed her ear to the door, and after hearing nothing but water running, she sighed and turned the key in the lock, slipping inside and shutting it—and locking it—behind her. It was easy, from there, to follow the only sound in the apartment to the master bathroom.

“Ben?” she called hesitantly; she didn’t know how he’d react to having someone in his apartment, especially drunk, and she couldn’t guarantee that he had even remembered calling him. She hadn’t been sure what his state was when she’d spoken to him, but as she pushed open the door to the master bedroom, it became clear to her.

His large frame was sprawled on the ground, one leg on either side of the toilet bowl. His bicep was propped against the glass door of the shower, head resting with his chin nearly to his collarbones. The water in the shower was still running, so she reached over him to turn the handles to off before kneeling next to him. “Ben?” she tried again, one hand coming out to rest on his shoulder.

Her touch jolted him awake, his head slamming back against the tile wall with force, dragging a yelp and a groan from his throat as an unsteady hand reached up to soothe the already-formed bump. “What the fuck?” he mumbled, trying but failing to sit up straight; he tilted to one side and then the other, with Rey finally guiding him to be propped up against the closed shower door again. “Rey? What—what are you doing here?” he questioned, his voice slightly clearer than before, but not by much.

“You called me,” she reminded him gently, pushing messy hair back from his forehead to clear his eyes. “Do you remember?”

That sobered Ben, if only in mind, and he stared at her for a moment before turning away from her, expression cold. “You shouldn’t be here,” he said bluntly, trying again to scramble up and get away from her, but he couldn’t make his body cooperate. “You shouldn’t—Why are you—I don’t—”

“Stop,” she directed him, placing a finger on his lips as the other hand gripped his shoulder, forcing him to look at her. “I can’t say I’m pleased with this,” she started, her disapproval clear from her tone, “but you can’t do this to yourself when you’re here alone, so… Get used to it.” It wasn’t the pep talk she’d planned, but she hadn’t been prepared for seeing him so—disheveled. He was always so collected, so put-together, so pristine, he had always seemed _untouchable_ and _unbreakable_ , and it was such a stark contrast to his usual self that she wasn’t sure how to handle it.

Thankfully, she’d always been good at improvising.

He didn’t seem in any state to move, and she surely couldn’t lift him, so she stood momentarily, taking a washcloth from the wall-mounted towel rack and running it under the faucet for a few moments, wringing it out before kneeling again and placing it on his forehead. When he brought his hand up to meet hers and she could tell he could handle keeping it pressed there, she settled to tuck into his side, her head resting on the shoulder she’d previously gripped to grab his attention.

“What are you doing?” he questioned her again. “You don’t need to sit here and take care of me. God knows I don’t deserve it.”

She looked up at him as though he’d just said something ridiculous, like he’d commented that eight-legged insects were called dogs or that it was going to rain Mountain Dew the next day. “Of course, you do,” she responded, no room in her tone for argument, and though he wanted to test her resolve, his mind swam.

He’d never understood comfortable silence. In his life, silence was something bad, something punishing; he was met with silence from his parents when he was disobedient, he was met with silence from Snoke when he didn’t perform well, and he was met with silence when he’d begged Bazine to tell him she hadn’t been dating him for his money. Silence had never been a good thing, but as they sat there, her occasionally reaching up to flip or re-wet the washcloth, or to run a reassuring hand through his hair as it dampened, or to trace the line of his jaw and smile at him, he found himself relaxing in the quiet until he didn’t feel as though he would crack his head open if he tried to stand again. When he made motions to try just that, Rey was there the whole way, standing one step behind him and nudging him towards the wall as he made his way from the bathroom to the bed.

As he rolled from his back to his side—just in case he were to be sick again in the night—she had already brought two water bottles from his refrigerator and a bottle of Ibuprofen he had sitting out on his counter, setting everything on the nightstand next to him. “You don’t have to—”

“But I want to,” she cut him off, uncapping one of the bottles and holding it out to him until he took it, chugging half of it before pausing to make sure it would stay down. When it did, he finished the rest of it, dropping the empty one in a wastepaper can next to his bed.

He’d never been good at accepting help, and he was even worse at asking for it, but as he looked up at her, eyes hopeful, he whispered: “Stay with me?”

-

They woke up the next morning far too early for his taste, his head pounding and his mouth dry, but he woke with her curled around him, dressed in one of his T-shirts with bare legs thrown over his sweatpants-clad lower half, her drool on his chest and her hair tickling her nose, and even though he felt like _dying_ , he smiled, allowing himself five minutes of relaxation before extracting himself from her grip to begin making her a thank-you breakfast.

They’d talk about it later, and for once, that didn’t scare him at all.


End file.
